Stuff that makes headlines!

- April 15, 2023

Stuff that makes headlines!

Before I start my weekly monologue, let me clarify. I have worked on the newsdesk of newspapers and a news agency for more than two decades and have first-hand experience of how taxing it can be physically and mentally, not to mention emotionally. People know reporters because they read their names, see them, hear them. However, those on the news desk who edit the copy, make pages, and bring out the edition, stay unseen.

But once in a rare blue moon, it is the sub-editors, senior sub-editors, chief sub-editors even the deputy news editors or news editors, on the desk who slip up and as a result, bring upon the wrath of their superiors on themselves. Yet for the readers that can be a ‘What the …’ or ‘Really’ moment? And believe me, even though the newspaper lives only for those 24 hours, the error lives forever.

Here are some bloopers for you to enjoy, smile at and maybe remember too. I have stuck to the mistakes found in Indian newspapers and sent by friends at some time or the other.

Headlines first.

Was the person manning the desk trying to be literal or sharing a piece of gossip?

Let me give you a hint. It is somber news but a number riddle too.

This is like the case of keeping sugar in a cookie tin labelled tea.

My sympathies with the people of Goa who must have repeatedly sh** in their pants watching a woman’s headless body moving about in their midst for nine long months.

Those on the sports desk love play of words for headlines. But sometimes, the readers might be confused.

Can you tell if the headline mentions James Donald Bond Jr., the American footballer and coach who played a century ago, or is it dragging the legendary suave spy into the game? And then, this player is James Rodriques, isn’t it, the child of his own parents? Did a paternity suit follow?

Vettel must be very gutsy (on personal and social fronts) if he is announcing to the whole world that he is ready for a lap dance. I thought that was something that men enjoyed but did not talk about openly.

The headline is bigger than the news item. It is, however, used here just so most of us have a reason to be grateful that our parents have been boring, regular people.

The blurb was written long before the issue of gay relations was talked of publicly. Neil Armstrong must have been the first one to come out.

Shall we look at some of the advertisements? I’ll talk of matrimonial ads some other time.

Poor Mr Gurdeep Singh! One of these notices would have disappointed him and sullied his reputation. I don’t know which one he preferred- the congratulations or the apology.

I have heard of Hell and Heaven, but did not know that a death certificate from earth is needed to get in. Surprisingly, nobody seems to have made an effort to ask him for first-hand knowledge about how it is in the other world.

It is a noble thought that they want to embrace militants back into the society. But my objection is we are an equal opportunity country, so why only militants from Palakkad and Coimbatore? By the way, do we have militants there?

India is a welfare state, we were taught in school. No wonder then that the airline, under sarkari management at that time, was working for the welfare of the jobless wanderers. A standing ovation, please!

Isn’t that cruel? Did anybody inform the child welfare department? Moreover, the ones in the picture do not look like adult toys.

Not from any newspaper but at the risk of sounding risqué, let me ask you, shouldn’t such issues always be timely or in time?

It looks like we are not the only ones who err. Let us be patriotic. Just two examples to change the taste left in your mouth.

This one sent by Cynthia Zimba nearly two years ago, is a public notice which appeared in the Daily News of Tanzania. But look at the action taken! Man, the bosses are strict about quality control.

And some of you too must have seen this at some time or the other! Poor Julia Roberts! I am sure even if the headline was true, she would not want all the readers of the newspaper to know about it.